| According to many scholars, the support of first-line police supervisors is a critical component of the successful implementation and practice of community policing. Police supervisors are responsible for translating the broad mission and goals of a department into meaningful directives for subordinates, a task that is particularly difficult during a time of organizational change. Despite the important role police supervisors play in the ultimate success of community policing, few researchers have attempted to understand the reactions of police supervisors to community policing, nor have many tried to identify the factors that facilitate the support of community policing by these individuals. Of the research that does exist, the preponderance of past studies rely solely on attitudinal measures of support. These studies assume a link between attitudes and behavior; that the attitudinally supportive supervisor will also be the most likely to practice community policing. Prior research, however, has provided reason to question the link between attitudes and behavior.;The current study sought to fill this gap in knowledge. Using data collected from a large-scale, multi-method study of policing in two departments practicing community policing (the Project on Policing Neighborhoods), this study measured the reactions of first-line police supervisors to community policing in behavioral terms (i.e., time spent engaged in community policing activities). Supervisors' attitudes toward community policing were included as a key independent variable. A framework borrowed from the organizational psychology literature situated this study in the larger context of research on the link between attitudes and behavior, allowing not only for an assessment of the extent to which supervisors can "talk the talk" of community policing (i.e., attitudes), but also of the extent to which they also "walk the talk" (behaviors). The theoretical framework employed in this study also identified five categories of variables (i.e., demographic, personal characteristics, role states, work experiences, and group leader relations) that were expected to influence the extent to which supervisors would engage in community policing.;Ultimately, results did not support the hypotheses suggested by the theoretical framework used to guide this study. In the end; this research provided more information about the factors that influence supervisors' attitudes toward community policing (originally conceptualized as an independent variable) than about their behavior. While this was not the initial goal of this research, these results add to the body of work in this area, and suggest areas of future inquiry. |
